Goin' Camping

Who's back: Five starters on offense, four on defense and 20 letter-winners.

Claim to fame: Team won 2004 Division I state championship and has made playoffs
14 times.

Alumni association: Running back Maurice Hall played for Ohio State. Receiver
Terry Glenn played for Ohio State and 11 seasons in the NFL for New England, Green Bay and Dallas.
Tight end Jeff Cumberland has played three seasons for the New York Jets.

Brookhaven High School was getting smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror of the family car
when Trevor White and his family began the long drive to a long-awaited trip to Disney World in
early June.

Wife Jessica thought, at last, there would be no playbooks, no videotape, no meetings --
really, no football anything -- while they were in the land of Mickey Mouse.

Ah, but Trevor, the head coach of the Bearcats, had his smart phone charged and was burning
up the minutes talking about, what else, football.

“If you ask Jessica, I spent the whole vacation on the phone," White said. “I was talking to
the athletic director about the eligibility of my players on the drive down. I talked to my
players. I talked to my coaches. I really worked that smart phone."

When the Whites returned home, Trevor dove into a pile of paperwork. There was the offseason
weight-lifting program to oversee. There were 10 days of practices to organize.

The smart phone continued to get a workout.

“I did mass texts to the players to let them know what was coming up on the schedule," White
said. “Then you are always calling players to talk about what is going on with them off the field.
Some of them have family problems to work out."

Such is life for a high-school football coach. Fans see him on the sideline Friday night for
10 weeks of the regular season and, hopefully, the playoffs, but there are hundreds of hours of
work throughout the calendar year that no one sees.

One veteran coach said that taking a minimum-wage job at a fast-food restaurant would bring
in much more money than a coaching job.

White and his staff aren't in it for the money. The reward is seeing players graduate, get to
college and learn a few life skills playing for the team along the way.

On Sunday, the day before training camp opened, White lined the practice field. Staffers have
mowed the field.

As for the helmets and shoulder pads, offensive coordinator Chuck Andrick is a good Mr.
Fix-it.

Then there's the irreplaceable “Pops," 67-year-old Walter Cooper. He has been an unpaid
volunteer going on 16 years. If the coaches or players need something, he gets it.

“I help us get ready for Friday night," said Cooper, who has beaten colon and throat cancer.
He has had a tracheotomy and speaks in that gravelly, machine-like tone. “I make sure the players
are hydrated. I repair equipment (on the fly)."

Pops began helping the Bearcats when grandsons James Cooper, Curtis King and Glenn Madison
played. He cried like a child on the sideline when the team won the 2004 Division II state
championships in Massillon.

“What I do is not hard work," he said. “I enjoy doing this. I see the players come and go. It
feels good to be a part of this. I look forward to this every year."

Cooper was so ill in April and May that doctors told him it might be wise to quit his
Brookhaven gig. A smile broke through the gray beard after he said that.

“I told them, no, I wasn't going to quit," he said. “I've been blessed by God and I'm not one
to give up. It's going to be a mad house here for the first game. It's going to be great. I can't
wait."

Times have been difficult for the Bearcats the past two years. They made the playoffs in 2011
but played the regular-season final against Mifflin and the first round of the postseason against
Marion-Franklin knowing that Columbus Public Schools designated Brookhaven for closure. That plan
was scrapped.

Last season the team finished 7-3 but missed the playoffs for only the fourth time since
1999.

This season, the roster is around the 45-player mark because of declining enrollment. The
work is cut out for White's staff of Andrick, Dave Laksl, Travis Clodfelter, Shawn Harris, Greg
Harrison, Damon Kimbrough and Wes Edwards. Everyone except White and Laksl are Brookhaven
graduates.

Quarterback Bruce Foster, a senior, appreciates the effort from the staff.

“The coaches do so much," he said. “We appreciate what they do. We want to win. We want to
make the playoffs again. We realize what this team means to the community. We want to raise the
level to where it was. That's our focus. We're serious about this."

No one wants to win more than White. But he learned as a volunteer assistant under legendary
Gary Carter at Walnut Ridge in the late 1990s that the game isn't as important as the people
playing it.

White showed up the first day expecting Carter to talk X's and O's and map strategy for
training camp.

“What we did was work with the equipment," White said. “We were fixing helmets and putting
together blocking sleds. I said, 'Well, this sure wasn't what I was expecting.' I quickly learned
that this is all about teaching kids. It's life. It's not all football."

This is White's third season as head coach at Brookhaven. He was a Bearcats assistant from
2000-06 under Gregg Miller and Tom Blake before working under best friend Brian Haffele at
Marion-Franklin for four years. He has known nothing but City League division championships and
playoff appearances.

Trevor made sure Jessica was OK with him becoming Bearcats coach before accepting the offer.
She knew he would have many 5 a.m. alarms and that some days would not end until the 11 o'clock
news.

“Some days I bring my sons, Luke (7 years old) and Landon (5), to practice," White said. “
That helps out Jessica a little bit."

White, a social studies teacher, said the feeling is strange once the football season ends.

“I'm home by 3 o'clock and it feels like I've worked only a half-day," he said.

There are still things to worry about, though. A representative from the helmet manufacturer
drops by in January or February to take orders and refurbish old ones.

“And when it rains hard I'm always wondering, 'Is all that equipment off the floor in the
storage room?'" he said.